Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="gizmo33" data-source="post: 2880816" data-attributes="member: 30001">I was paraphrasing a number of other posts I've made where I gave some examples.  I'll try again below.My point was that success requires ability AND opportunity.But political success might not be determined by political ability.  I think it's debateable to what degree a Balor's stats indicates that it is successful in the Abyss.  A Solar probably has a great Diplomacy skill, but my sense is that it would fare poorly in the Abyss.  I tend to apply circumstantial modifiers to Diplomacy rolls.  This means that Balors probably don't do well when interacting with the greater demons (like the Type V in your example).  I'm extrapolating this from the fact that the demon lords and princes don't like them.  Something about their lawful natures rub the lords the wrong way, I would assume something similar with Type V demons.  A Type V demon would expect to indulge it's appetites - something a Balor may fail to appreciate to the extent that it's hard for the two to work together.No, I'm saying that opportunity is also part of the equation, not just ability.  Ok, here's a chance for particulars.  The minute the Balor says something like this, Yeenoghu's quasit spies are going to tell him about it (and the whole court is going to get  a big laugh about how offensively Lawful the statement was).  The Marilith knows this, and knows that a horde of Nalfeshnee would love to get their hands on the treasure of a demon the status of either the Balor or Marilith.  Now the Balor has pretty much sealed his fate.  Yeenoghu plus a few eager Nalfeshnee (8 of them equal EL 20, let's say) are probably going to kill both of them.  Given that it's Y's home turf, he can probably choose the time and circumstances of the battle (and bring more of a horde than just some Nalfeshnee).  In any case, the Marilith has only a moment to make up her mind.  If she joins Y's side, the outcome is assured, the Balor dies, and she, as a demon of status, is assured some loot.  Joining the Balor, there are no assurances at all, and given that the other demons in Ys court are going to make similar calculations, they'll go with the majority - just deciding to follow the Balor when you can't be sure that anyone else is going to is crazy IMO - any creature fearing an eternity of torture in the Abyss isn't going to just way "what the heck" because they can always roll up another character.  The Nalfeshnee have probably been given special status by Yeenoghu - the Balor probably has an axe to grind with some of them over past incidents - so even if the Balor were to find some way of killing Yeenoghu, he would find himself facing an aristocracy of resentful demons that stand to lose their priviledges in the new administration.  A Marilith + Nalfeshnee elite could kill the Balor, thus advancing the status of the Marilith.  The Balor would do this calculation, and perhaps not trust the Marilith.  And it goes around and around.  All the while the quasits would be feeding false information to the parties concerned, and Yeenoghu would be manipulating the loyalties and feelings of the parties involved.  This goes on all of the time in dictatorships, and a dictator doesn't need to be able to beat 500 of his followers in single combat to keep his place.What bearing does Diplomacy have in all of this?  What are the chances of a Balor convincing someone to face almost certain destruction in an attempt to replace one overlord with another?  And a Balor overlord at that?  One who notoriously imposes an uncomfortable number of lawful restrictions on the appetites of the demoness.  "Don't eat those fighter's" the Balor's going to say - I need them for my machinations, plus your gluttony is not "sophisticated".  Life under a Balor demon lord is boring to a demon when you're a demon aristocrat like a Marilith.How very uncharacteristically Lawful Evil of her!  Indulging the appetites of her demonic nature is something the Balor clearly has little appreication for.  It's not that the Marilith doesn't hate Yeenoghu too, but at least with him he's not killing her nun-induced buzz with some dreary "evil crusade".But they all hate each other too.  The Balor probably cheated the Marilith at cards one time that the Marilith never forgave him for.  Now they're showing up in Yeenoghu's throne room - the Marilith says to Yeenoghu "hey, this loser's trying to get me to fight you, let me kill him and some stuff back that he won from me in a card game."  Yeenoghu, the Nalfeshnee, and Marilith all fall on the Balor.  I don't know what kind of Diplomacy check the Balor has to make to convince the Marilith that she doesn't hate him but my guess is that it's pretty high.  After the Nalfeshnee are done eating the Balor, Yeenoghu turns to the Marilith "is 'hey' anyway to address your lord?"  The Nalfeshnee might dine well that day.  For each of the individual Nalfeshnee, the fate of these greater demons is a lesson.At this point the Yeenoghu of your campaign is isolated and politically outmaneuvered by the Balor.  Yes, absolutely, Yeenoghu will die in this case.  You're missing the Nalfeshnee, Glabrezu, Quasits, and hordes of lesser creatures who would take intense pleasure in killing the Balor and the Marilith - a feat accomplished easily with the aid of Yeenoghu. Their hostility is cut short by a ravenous pack of demons descending on them due to a number of unholy promises whispered in their ears by quasit spies.  Of course each of the demons believes that he might possibly gain some great favor and treasure promised by Yeenoghu for this action.  After all, the rest of the demon horde is rabble but "I'm special" thinks a particular demon.  Of course the quasit was lying as the member of the horde finds out after having lost half their number taking down the Balor and his Marilith ally.  Oh well, any individual member of the horde who objects within range of a Detect Thoughts spell will have to take it up with the Nalfeshnee council.Seems to work just fine for much of the real world.  And if that's debateable, in a fantasy world you certainly could manipulate situation so that intimidation from a demon lord IS a very powerful motivator.Yet another thing that I imagine demon lords and dictators to have in common is that the Balor has reason to hate the Marilith as much as Yeenoghu.  Part of Yeenoghu's success in ruling is to make sure that this is the case.  Your Balor and Marilith in this example seem to have materialized out of no where.  What if they had personal backgrounds?  If all they are are stat-blocks then I can see that manipulating them would seem difficult.I don't see this.  Yeenoghu, plus Nalfeshnee, plus Glabrezu, plus Quasits beat the Balor.  1,000 gp and the chance to devour the heart of a demon of status trumps the "feel good" effect of a good Diplomacy roll IMC.  The Balor might make the Marilith feel good about herself, but so would taking his stuff.Is there a difference?  Oh well, I tried.  I'm trying not to be silly, but it's hard given the subject.  Maybe I'm not as silly as you think.HmmmmDemon 1:  "I'm prone to taking charge."Demon 2:  "I'm prone to letting you eat Demon 1 and take his stuff because I'm not lawful like this loser.  Follow him and you'll be doing drills all of the time.  Plus Orcus likes me and hates this guy."The demon horde eats demon 1.I think we clearly have a different sense of Abyssal demographics if you think that CR 20 contenders to Yeenoghu's power are common. Well, it's a somewhat late development in this debate to make this a matter of Yeenoghu not having a high enough diplomacy rolls.  I will recognize that if Diplomacy is of use to demon-psychology (and why would a Balor have it otherwise?) then Yeenoghu's Diplomacy score it too low.BTW - what the heck does a comsically evil creature sound like when it's being diplomatic?  And what creature of 18 int is going to believe that a chaotic evil creature likes them?  I think the demons are intelligent enough to know that each other is chaotic evil.  I'm a bit old-school in that it takes a phenomenal Diplomacy roll to make someone do something stupid."Pointless"?  "Pretend"?  Man, what kind of Diplomacy check did you roll there?</blockquote>

Verification